Tabu search is a meta-heuristic based on recency
memory. Tabu search can explore good solutions around a
given solution by using a local or neighborhood search procedure
and a Tabu list. The ideas between ACO and Tabu search are very
different. Tabu search does not rely on the ‘‘history” information
from the preceding search but randomly to select the search direction
which can enlarge search space. Meantime, determining the
initial solution of Tabu search is difficult. Considering the natures
of ACO and Tabu search, this paper presents a hybrid algorithm
integrating ACO and Tabu search to solve VRPTW. This paper is organized
as follows. The problem formulation of VRPTW is introduced
in Section 2. Section 3 describes the hybrid algorithm.
Section 4 validates the proposed hybrid algorithm by Solomon’s
benchmark test problems (Solomon, 1987). Lastly, conclusions
are given in Section 5.